Barrington trips up South again

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BARRINGTON – What started out as a promising night for Crystal Lake South’s hockey team turned into an all-too-familiar refrain.

The Gators played tough in the first period and took a one-goal lead on Barrington, but the Broncos scored the game’s next four goals and defeated the Gators, 5-3, Sunday in their Metro Central Scholastic Cup playoffs game at the Barrington Ice Arena.

Barrington is the one team that the Gators have not been able to beat in recent years.

South’s No. 1 line of Kenny Hall, Scottie Stalo and Brian Lichterman combined for two first-period goals as South (30-10-6 overall, 3-1 Scholastic) took a 2-1 lead. Barrington (4-0 Scholastic) took over in the second period with constant pressure. The Broncos got three of their goals on power plays.

“They capitalize whenever you mess up,” Gators center Joey Bower said. “I don’t know how they do it, but they find a hole and go. We came out fired up and were flying. I thought we had momentum [up 2-1], but we let up a little bit.”

Hall scored first, then Barrington tied the score on Craig Caplin’s goal. Stalo scored later in the first, but Alex Wagner scored twice in the second period for the Broncos. Caplin finished with two goals and two assists.

“Our penalties killed us a little bit,” Hall said. “We couldn’t get the puck out of our end in the second period.”

Bower eventually scored with 2:03 remaining in the game, but the Gators couldn’t catch Barrington.

“They got the puck in deep and had a guy high, so when we tried to clear they were able to keep it in,” South coach Rich Perillo said. “We didn’t capitalize on power plays enough. We needed to get more power-play goals.”

Barrington’s remaining games are against Fremd on Tuesday and Cary-Grove on Wednesday. South plays PREP on Tuesday in its final Scholastic game. The Gators can assure themselves of advancing as one of the two teams with a victory.

Barrington coach Rob Hutson was playing with 11 skaters and recently lost forward Zach Dulla, who suffered a collapsed lung. So playing from behind after one period was not a big deal to the Broncos.

“They’ve always found a way to overcome adversity this year,” Hutson said. “We’re missing two potential All-State players [Dulla and Brian McGregor]. They’re a great team, but we’re hard to beat. I’m proud to say I coach these kids.”

Barrington won the Metro Central regular season at 19-1-2.

The game ended with a skirmish between South’s Tyler Bigos and Barrington’s Patrick McVickers. Hutson chose not to have his players go through the handshake line to prevent further trouble, a decision with which Perillo and South’s fans did not agree.

“Somebody had to be smart enough to have them not shake hands,” Hutson said. “I just felt I needed to do that.”